Mauricio Segura

Born in Temuco, Chile, Mauricio Segura arrived in Montréal at the age of five with his parents. After studying economics at the Université de Montréal and completing his doctorate in French Language and Literature from McGill University, he worked as a successful journalist, scriptwriter, and documentary filmmaker. He is the author of four novels and a book about French perceptions of Latin America. All of his novels, including his most recent, Oscar, have been translated to English by Biblioasis.

Oscar

Biblioasis

Set in Montréal in the 1950s, Oscartells the story of Oscar P., whose older brother Brad plays the piano with mythic skill: every time he sits down at the bench, the rain stops, summer returns, and the sun refuses to set. After Brad succumbs to the white plague, Oscar too spends his days fighting disease, confined to a hospital. Playing the organ at night for a mysterious sickly girl, he discovers his own talent, although years after recovery, he finds himself desperate, poor, and depressed—until the devil, otherwise known to the world as impresario Norman G, happens on him in a moment of crisis.